Arcs
by Hoppiholla
Summary: [VOLTVERSE PART TWO] A collection of one-shots in the Volt universe, between Volt and the upcoming sequel, Superconductors. CHAPTER ONE: Leah moves into Stark Tower.


**Heyo, guys! Yeah, it's been, what...just a few weeks since I finished up **_**Volt? **_**Heh, I just couldn't stay away. Sorry. Speaking of which, if you're reading this, and you for some reason **_**haven't **_**read **_**Volt **_**yet? I strongly advise you do. Actually, it's kind of mandatory. If you don't, you won't know who the heck the main character is, so...yeah. It'd be a good idea to read **_**Volt **_**first.**

_**Arcs **_**is just going to be a collection of one-shots (or maybe even some two-shots, omg) in the **_**Volt-**_**verse, starting directly after **_**Avengers **_**ended and going on from there. I don't know how many there'll be, but don't worry about the length affecting **_**Superconductor**_—**once I get enough one-shots to cover the span of time I want to put between **_**Volt **_**and **_**Superconductor, **_**I'll work on both of them. Obviously, **_**Superconductor **_**will be the main focus, but I'll be updating **_**Arcs **_**sporadically for quite a while. There's no set posting schedule (cause that worked out so well for **_**Volt, **_**heh), but since this should just be a bunch of short one-shots, it should actually go faster—no complicated plots to tie together. Alright, I've talked enough for one author's note—I'm sure you guys are itching to get back into the 'verse just as much as I am. Shall we start off with Tony being a little shit...**

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The walls of her new two-room suite in Stark Tower were painted neon pink, with cheerfully eye-burning yellow flowers patterned over it.

It kind of made Leah Smith want to tear out her eyeballs.

She blinked about ninety times, trying to clear the sudden spots from her vision as she abruptly felt she was staring at a _fucking neon pink sun. _Leah growled, dropped her mostly-empty shiny-new duffel bag on the somehow _also bright yellow _floor, and stomped back out the way she had come. Down the hallway, following her defiantly dusty footsteps back towards the shiny elevators, past that section, and through a glass door before making her way to the lab. Those keypads along the walls were probably supposed to be used, but the door to Tony's main lab swung open in front of her. Cause she was good like that. Leah stomped into the lab, fists clenched and scowling, and opened her mouth to yell—

And found that no one was there.

Her mouth closed with a snap, and Leah's eyes narrowed suspiciously. He had to have been in here. Tony didn't _go _anywhere else, unless it was to bother Bruce in his lab. He even had his own coffee machine down here—four of them, actually. Staring bewildered around the room, Leah's eyes locked on the Iron Man gauntlet sitting on it's stand, wide open with wires trailing out of it. There were tools strewn all around it, one sensor still clamped around a wire and hanging off the edge.

...as if they had been hastily abandoned.

Casting her view outward, Leah made a slow turn as she looked around the room, narrow-eyed. She cast her powered senses out, too—it was hard to get past the interference of the electricity that ran throughout Stark Tower, clustered especially loudly in the workshop, but not impossible. And she knew exactly what she was looking for. Tony's arc reactor didn't show up on her superpowered radar like most other electronics—she didn't know why, and he certainly wouldn't tell her—but his phone did...

ACDC's 'Shoot to Thrill' blared tinnily from the other side of the 'shop, and Leah grinned. She went tearing across the room as she heard muffled curses from the same spot. Vaulting a workbench, she reached out a hand to the opposite wall and yanked open the electronically locked storage with a jolt of power.

By the time the door opened, Tony Stark already stood against the opposite wall with his hands raised defensively.

"It wasn't me, and it's hurtful you should accuse me of it," he said instantly. Leah snorted and rolled her eyes.

"You didn't do it, so that's why you're hiding." She leaned closer meaningfully. "In a _closet_."

Tony narrowed his eyes at her. "I resent those implications," he told her.

"Luckily, I don't care." Leah folded her arms, making sure to stand right in the middle of the doorway. "Tony. My room is yellow and pink. _Neon pink._"

"Hmm, that sounds like a design issue, you'll have to take it up with the interior decorator—"

Leah pinched the bridge of her nose, dropping her face into her hand. "My _floor _is yellow," she gritted out.

"That...seems like an interesting color scheme," Tony said slowly, but his eyes darted around looking for escape routes. There were none. There was a pause, then he yelped as she threw a screwdriver at him she had picked up from a bench. "Jesus Christ, kid, weaponizing my tools is unacceptable—any of my tools—"

"I'm going to bypass _that _innuendo and go ahead and say _what the fuck, Stark,_" Leah growled, and Tony subsided, folding his arms.

"You don't like white rooms, kid," he said, shrugging. "So you got the opposite."

Leah opened her mouth to snark back, then closed it without a sound. She knew that Tony knew she had nightmares, and that she had had a particularly bad one in the room SHIELD had given her before Loki attacked the Helicarrier. Her bright white, sterile, cell-like room. Leah's eyebrows raised as she considered the truth of his statement—of course, that didn't change the fact that _her room was more neon than a rave._

"Please, for the love of God," she began eventually, "repaint. Please. I will start talking to the pink flowers in my yellow-wall-induced insanity, and the flowers will talk _back._"

Tony snorted, and sidled past her back into the workshop. "Don't worry, kid, those aren't your rooms."

Leah's eyes narrowed as she caught up to him. "What, changed your mind? Going to put me in a neon cardboard box out back instead?" They entered the elevator, and Tony input a floor number, and a series of complicated codes coupled with a finger scan. What could possibly need such high security? Tony gave her a smug grin as the elevator doors opened and he led her through a small foyer and another heavily-locked door.

"_These _are your rooms."

Leah's mouth dropped open in shock as she took in the scene before her. There was an honest-to-god living room, complete with television, couches, and she could see a kitchenette tucked in a corner. Broad windows made up one wall, but just by sensing it she could feel the panel that would make them opaque. Through a glass door she could see a miniature workshop-nothing fancy or dangerous that couldn't be kept up here, but enough scraps, tools, and wires to experiment with, plus several holographic screens already whirring away on standby. Stunned, Leah moved across the main room and peered into the other rooms-a cozy bedroom and spacious bathroom, even a tiny closet that she could feel had some sort of fancy electronics built in. It was only when she turned around, her mouth still hanging open and her eyes huge, that Tony panicked and started to ramble.

"That's an access port," he said abruptly. "There's no code, no nothing you can put in, just-it takes just a spark of your power, and it'll slide right open, the tube connects to the main ventilation system for the building. No, uh-no access from the other side either, so don't worry about Barton breaking in at inopportune times." Leah started moving forward, and he backpedaled rapidly, speaking even faster. "It's not just you, alright, everyone has a floor-or, wait, no, is that wrong? It's okay, if it's not big enough, we can do bigger, yeah, different everything, I-"

Tony choked into silence when Leah's arms wrapped around his shoulders and she hugged him tightly.

"...you're welcome, kid," he said gruffly, patting her on the back. She squeezed him once, then released him all at once and stepped back quickly.

"Yeah, thanks," Leah muttered, rubbing the back of her neck awkwardly. Hesitantly, though, she sat down on one of the couches, and Tony let go of a breath he didn't know he'd been holding. He smiled at her, backing away out the door.

"Anything you need, just, get Jarvis, you know Jarvis, right-"

Leah blinked. "Uh, no, I don't-"

Tony blinked in return, then chortled. "Ha, that'll be later, then, god, I can't wait for _that _meeting, anyway, you need something, just get me-"

Her quiet, heartfelt "Thanks, Tony," stopped him in his tracks. His smile turned warm, and she smiled in return.

"Don't mention it kid. You're _most _welcome," he said softly, then closed the door behind him on her bright grin.

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**And that's the first of the short little one-shots! Don't worry, there will be more. Plenty more. Next one, I think, is going to be Leah's first conversation with Jarvis, and maybe Dummy and the other bots! Please review!**

**-Hoppi**


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